The Problems of Web Accessibility Essay Example

The Problems of Web Accessibility Essay Increased interaction of elderly and disabled people with web content after the setting up of World Wide Web (WWW) has created problems such as Web Accessibility. With the increase in users of Geographical Information System (GIS), it also started facing the problem of web accessibility issues. The users started interacting with the maps extensively in the recent years which ultimately intensified the web accessibility problems in GIS applications. User interaction content evaluation are helpful in identifying the web accessibility difficulties faced by GIS application users. Web accessibility problems can’t be identified by automated tools or guidelines but users are involved for that purpose. To identify the accessibility problems of users at initial stages, User Centred Approach is used in which users are included in the development process. With the help of user interaction evaluation and content evaluation the author attempts to identify the accessibility issues in GIS applications in this research project. A case study of web based GIS application called MapQuest is undertaken to discover the web accessibility issues pertaining in GIS applications. Another web based GIS application called Google Maps along with MapQuest was evaluated for identifying usability issues. The usability evaluation of aforementioned two GIS application were conducted using special criterion. Different research methodologies such as usability tests, questionnaires etc were carried out on users from different backgrounds. The report concludes with recommending UCD approach especially in development process through which the web based GIS application’s accessibility can be improved and enhanced. We will write a custom essay sample on The Problems of Web Accessibility specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on The Problems of Web Accessibility specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on The Problems of Web Accessibility specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer This research project also suggests ways to improve the usability of GIS applications on the basis of studies conducted. TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACTi TABLE OF CONTENTSii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION1 1. 1 Problem statement:1 1. 2 Aims:2 1. 3 Objectives:2 1. 4 Resources:3 1. 5 Risk:3 CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW4 2. 1 What is GIS? 4 2. 2 Potential of GIS4 2. 3 Role of GIS/ Web based GIS5 2. 4 Web Accessibility7 2. 5 Importance of Web Accessibility8 2. 6 Web Accessibility Guidelines8 2. 7 Web Accessibility Evaluation9 2. 8 What is User Centred Design (UCD)10 2. Advantages and disadvantages of UCD13 2. 10 Elements of UCD13 2. 11 UCD and Web based GIS14 2. 12 Usability definitions and its role15 CHAPTER 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY19 3. 1 Research Process19 3. 2 Literature Review20 3. 3 Experiment21 3. 4 Questionnaires22 3. 5 Interviews23 3. 6 Case study23 CHAPTER 4 EMPIRICAL STUDY25 4. 1 Planning for Web Accessibility Test25 4. 2 Dichotomous method Vs Continuous numerical measurement method25 4. 3 We b Accessibility Guidelines26 4. 4 The need for automatic evaluation27 4. 5 Properties of Good Web Accessibility Metric27 4. Web Accessibility Barrier (WAB)28 4. 7 Construction of plan to evaluate the Web Accessibility of GIS Website MapQuest29 4. 8 Google Maps MapQuest usability testing35 4. 9 Questionnaire36 CHAPTER 5 RESULTS / ANALYSIS37 5. 1 First Evaluation- Standard Review Method:37 5. 2 WAB Score of MapQuest:42 5. 3 Second Evaluation Goal Question Metric Method (GQM)44 5. 4 Over All response of Questionnaire44 5. 5 Role of UCD (User Centred Design) in Accessibility47 5. 5. 1 Interview Results48 5. 6 Section 249 5. 6. 1 Results achieved from usability tests:49 5. 6. List of observation from usability tests51 5. 6. 3 Results from the questionnaires51 5. 6. 4 Comparison of Google MapQuest53 CHAPTER 6 DISCUSSION/ANALYSIS AND VALIDITY STATEMENTS55 SECTION I55 6. 1 Discussion55 6. 1. 1 Perceivable56 6. 1. 2 Operable57 6. 1. 3 Understandable57 6. 1. 4 Robust58 6. 2 User Centred D esign and Accessibility58 6. 2. 1 User Centred Design59 6. 2. 2 User Centred Design and Accessibility Problems59 6. 3 Validity Statement60 6. 3. 1 Credibility60 6. 3. 2 Transferability60 6. 3. 3 Dependability61 6. 3. 4 Confirmability61 6. 4 Section II62 . 4. 1 Effectiveness62 6. 4. 2 Usefulness62 6. 4. 3 User Reaction63 6. 4. 4 Consistency63 6. 4. 5 Architectural and Visual Clarity63 6. 4. 6 Functionality64 6. 5 Validation64 6. 5. 1 Credibility64 6. 5. 2 Transferability65 6. 5. 3 Dependability65 6. 5. 4 Conformability65 6. 6 Selection of Usability Criteria65 CHAPTER 7 CONCLUSION, SUGGESTIONS AND FUTURE WORK67 7. 1 Conclusion67 7. 2 Suggestions68 7. 2. 1 Suggestions for Google Maps69 7. 2. 2 Suggestions for MapQuest70 7. 3 Future Work71 REFERENCES:72 APPENDIX A80 APPENDIX B86 APPENDIX C94 APPENDIX D96 APPENDIX E98 APPENDIX F100 APPENDIX G101 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1. 1 Problem statement: In the early days of Geographical Information System (GIS), not much emphasize was put upon how users interact with GIS but only on gathering and presenting more and more geographical data. But today, research on geographical data use is focusing more and more on how users interact with this data (Wilson et al, 2008). When GIS became available on the web, its user base expanded dramatically and now it is not only for geographers or others who know geographical terms but also for naive users. With the expansion of the pool of targeted users with variety of skills and knowledge, there is a need of more user-centred design of GIS. Although great advancements have been made concerning technical aspects and collecting geospatial information, there is a lack of research on human interaction with GIS and behaviour factors (Pick Gray, 2006). There may be two ways to enhance the accessibility of GIS Applications; either teaches the non expert users about GIS or make GIS usable for non experts through user centred design. The first approach to enhance the accessibility has limitations due to the large and rapidly growing number of non expert users and their lack of understanding of GIS terminologies. Yet another issue is that while making GIS more users centred, the true shape and most of the features of GIS should not be compromised. Usability is important concerning the web and if any website has problems like file downloading takes time, no clear navigations and not oriented towards the needs of the users, then users get frustrated and they will not use this website in future (Barnum, 2002). The interface of the web application must be so simple that experienced and non experienced users can easily use it and fulfil their requirements with it. The users are only satisfied when they can achieve their goals in a successful and efficient way. (Dillon, 1994) Usability evaluation has methodologies that help to measure usability aspects in system interfaces and also identify the problems. During the interface design process, Usability evaluation has an important role that includes interactive cycle of designing, prototyping and evaluating (Ivory Hearst, 2001). Usability evaluation methods play an important role in the designing of most GIS applications because usability aspects included in product design give credibility to company and customers are more satisfied with the products. Map applications are nowadays used by many users who have less experience in using the geospatial data, so usability aspects give benefits to the users accessing internet based services which contain easy to use and attractive exploring functions. Usability thus has an important contribution in the development of successful web-based GIS applications (Nivala et al. , 2008). Koua et al. (2006) proposed usability evaluation criteria for GIS applications; this evaluation helps to assess the ability of GIS applications regarding user performance and satisfaction. This evaluation is very important for evaluation of web-based GIS application because many usability issues can be taken care of through usability testing. This dissertation will evaluate and discuss the accessibility and usability issues faced by users with different disabilities, different knowledge and different social environments. It will aim to find out how can user centred design (UCD) be helpful to enhance the accessibility of web based GIS? 1. 2 Aims: The goal of this dissertation is to explore issues related to the accessibility of GIS by elderly and disabled people through user-centred approach, and investigate the end-users requirements by conducting usability test, questionnaires and interviews. 1. 3 Objectives: To explore issues related to the accessibility of GIS through user-centred approach * To study the common problems faced by naive users in using GIS applications * To find out the common design attributes for GIS applications that can be accessible for all types of the users * To prove the importance of the end-users in all phases of software development * To study the UI design of GIS and identify shortcomings that can be tuned to increase the accessibility * To identify the role of UCD design in designing GIS applications which are more accessible to users of all abilities * To identify various usability issues. To explore various web based evaluation techniques. To explore such criteria for usability evaluation that can be especially relevant for web-based GIS applications. These criteria could be in relation to the specific challenges that these applications have, and might be somewhat different than traditional usability criteria, due to the fact that usability evaluation was developed earlier than web-based GIS applications. 1. 4 Resources: The resources needed to complete this dissertation successfully will be Library Services, Internet. Library service will provide access to books, journals, articles to conduct the research required to complete the dissertation. Internet services will also be used extensively for research and also it will be useful for sending questionnaires to the volunteers, and analysing the case studies that will be used in this dissertation. Also ‘EvalAccess 2. 0’ tool which is software and will be used to compare the accessibility of GIS applications. 1. 5 Risk: This dissertation will focus on accessibility and usability issues of disabled people as a whole. Because of time constraint it doesn’t choose limited users from each category of disability. Choosing each category of disability would bring up more concise results. CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter is organized into three sections. Section 1 discusses the role of Web GIS, the potential of Web based GIS and who are its users. Further, HCI related issues in web based GIS are discussed. Section 2 discusses the evolution of Web Accessibility and the importance of accessibility of web contents. It also researches the guidelines and web standards regarding accessibility made by the international community World Wide Web consortium (W3C). Then the accessibility of web based GIS. In section 3 the overlook of what is User Centred Design, its elements and relevance of User Centred Design and Accessibility is presented. 2. 1 What is GIS? Good science is said to begin with clear definitions; but it is hard to give a clear cut definition of geographical information systems. As a result, different definitions have been proposed with the passage of time depending on the context. So we can define the term geographical information system in a variety of ways and each definition depends upon what we are searching for. The immense in GIS in recent years is due to the advancement in other technologies and fields that correlate and support the GIS system, such as geography and cartography, geo-visualization, computer science, database theory and mathematics field. Ron Abler has defined GIS as â€Å"Not just one but many simultaneous technological revolutions† (Clarke, 2004). So it is clear that GIS is not a new killer-application but it is an essential and innovative application like spreadsheet, database management systems and word processors. Another author, Peter Burrough, has defined GIS as â€Å"A powerful set of tools for storing and retrieving at will, transforming and displaying spatial data from the real world for a particular set of purposes†. Different authors have tried to define GIS in terms of its functionality. So another definition of GIS is â€Å"An automated system for the capture, storage, retrieval, analysis and display of spatial data†. (Clarke, 2004) 2. 2 Potential of GIS From the above it can be concluded that geographical information systems are known as powerful and integrating tools for managing and analyzing geo spatial data. The merging of the GIS technology with internet has introduced a new area of research referred to as web based GIS, on-line GIS, internet GIS and internet distributed GIS services. As accessibility to the web is easier for every one; web based GIS plays a major role by offering GIS functionality on the web (Kraak, 2004). Initially static maps have been developed then interactive maps with zooming features were introduced and now dynamic maps have been introduced with multiple features to give maximum functionality and accessibility to its users as a virtual communication tool. Web based GIS is still an emerging field and it is a broad area which involves a lot of issues that still need to be researched, such as spatial analysis and modelling, spatial database designing, wireless and mobile services and 3D data access and query. (Dragicevic, 2004) The World Wide Web has also altered the role of maps and makes them more dynamic. The map can be an essential part of the search engine, especially if we are referring to geospatial data. Maps can also play an important role by acting as an interface for geographical and non geographical information on the net. Maps can be helpful in guiding us from location ‘A’ to ‘B’, viewing the arrangement of the landscape, displaying urban plans and show changes occurring in population distributions. Hardware and software developments have made a tremendous change in the scientific and social needs for spatial data and for maps. The web not only presents dynamic data but also gives the user the ability to interact with the system, and there is subsequently a growing demand of the current users for faster and real time access to data. The role of the maps is definitely central in the web based GIS environment. The dynamic and interactive nature of the maps assists the users in solving geo-spatial analysis problems. (Kraak, 2004) 2. 3 Role of GIS/ Web based GIS The role of GIS is broad and it can act as an information system, support for decision making and may be helpful for emergency management, crises management and earth quake situations. Clarke (2004) quotes that Jack Estes and the late Jeffrey Star has taken GIS as an information system and they defined this as â€Å"An information system that is designed to work with data referenced by spatial or geo-graphic coordinates. In other words, a GIS is both a database system with specific capabilities for spatial-referenced data, as well as a set of operations for working with the data†. Based upon the above definition we can say that GIS is an information system that answers the user‘s queries. Whenever it receives a query from the user side, it collects relevant data, filters and sorts that data and then displays it before the user in a relevant form. Thus we can say that a GIS tool gives the solution of generic problems. GIS has proven its importance worldwide and web based GIS technology has shown its advantages in a variety of areas such as planning applications, decision making, management of historical buildings, and e-government etc. Web based GIS fulfils the requirements of e-government by sharing geographical data both within the organization and with the outside world. Geography is in some sense the glue that can integrate the data scattered in different departments and lying at different locations. Web based GIS is the first step in e-government that ensures the sharing of essential information between all the departments in local authority. Thus this technology enhances the internal and external communication, operations, efficiency within the organization and builds up a positive relationship with its citizens and/or visitors. Figure 2. 1 GIS working as glue, integrate scattered data (Stachowicz, 2004) Web based GIS provides centralized and easy access to spatial data for the users. It is the demand of the users for up-to-date, timely and rapid access to the data. Web based GIS fulfil all these requirements and provide dynamic geographical information to the users in an easy and accessible format. Web based maps assist the users in location finding, route finding and quick decision making. 2. 4 Web Accessibility When we talk about accessibility of a web page, it means that the web page should be accessible to almost every one with all abilities. During the start of World Wide Web, pages were more accessible because almost all web pages consisted of text which could be made more accessible with less complexity. With the advancement of web technologies and hence addition of more complexity, it is now difficult to make web pages accessible to all. Web designers started to include images, frames, streaming audio and video and different kinds of applications, which have made web pages full of hurdles for users with disabilities. (Hackett, 2004) The awareness is on rise about user‘s rights about the access of World Wide Web and there is recognition worldwide about the same rights of access to information on Web for people with disabilities. Legislation about the accessibility of web contents in different countries portrays the importance of the issue of making information on web accessible for all. Richards, 2004) Most of the developed countries have built their own guidelines or refined WCAG guidelines to make web contents more accessible. Increasing accessibility of web content is not only beneficial for people with disabilities but also for common users with lower ebb of resources like lower connection speed, lower processing speed. Mynatt (2000) believes as the average age of world population is increasing as a result t here will be increase in the group of senior citizens accessing information on the web. With aging, most people have deprived some of their abilities like focus, resolve images and distinguish colours. So if we look at cost to benefits ratio, it is clearly indicating more benefits than cost. It may increase the cost one to percent to make website accessible but it will result in increase of users by almost twenty percent. Web Accessibility is directed to address different kind of users and accessibility varies depending upon the disability type of the users. The users which could be addressed by Web Accessibility may have the following disabilities * Visual: From intense degree of blindness to low vision and colour blindness all include in this group * Mobility: People feeling difficulty in using input devices particularly mouse due to immobility or loss of control of relevant muscle * Auditory: people feeling difficulty or disability to listen * Cognitive: peoples having difficulty or disability to understand, learn, memorize or giving attention etc. 2. 5 Importance of Web Accessibility There is general perception that accessibility means web contents should be make accessible to users with disabilities like blind users. The area of web accessibility deals more than this limited view. In broader view Web Accessibility means making web contents available for as many users as possible. The user may range from common user to user with disabilities such as vision, mobility or learning impairment, users having limited network speed, slow processing speed compelling browsers to show text only version of websites and also users with mobile phone and PDAs with limited bandwidth and memory. Jackson, 2003) If we look at the cost benefit equation of making web content accessible we can clearly find this equation giving more benefits than cost by increasing users with substantial effort. For example minor changing of adding ALT tags for images will make large some difference. Advantages of making web contents more accessible can be increased by broadening the definition of â₠¬Ëœwho’ will get gain more access by this adaptation. Elder people are big percent of whole population and if you ignore web accessibility you are simply ignoring large chunk of possible users. Also this portion of population posses more free time and also discretionary spending power. Web contents can be converted into more accessible for adults by making the contents easy to read, reducing cognition and more efficient and easy use of keyboard and mouse. (Richards, 2004) 2. 6 Web Accessibility Guidelines In 1997 the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) was setup by World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to define international standards for users with disabilities. The standards are divided into three different groups. . Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2. User Agent Accessibility Guidelines 3. Authoring Tools Accessibility Guidelines WCAG 1. 0 the first version of web content guidelines is mainly for websites with static information. But with advancement in web technology these guidelines are not sufficient to handle the emerging issues related to accessibility of web contents. To meet this challenging situation W3C‘s Web Accessibility Initiative gave a new version of gu idelines namely WCAG 2. 0 (Reid Snow-Weaver, 2008). Since 1997 W3C‘s Web Accessible Initiative is successfully promoting WCAG around the world. Many organizations have taken benefits from these guidelines in changing their web contents into more accessible form. Also there is more inclination now at national level to adopt these guidelines to standardize the web content. (Kelly et al, 2007) 2. 7 Web Accessibility Evaluation Accessibility of web content is evaluated to check the degree of accessibility available to the contents for users of all kinds. There are different methods to evaluate the web accessibility of any web content. Generally web content can be considered accessible if it follows the regulation provided by WAI‘s WCAG 2. 0 (Villegas et al, 2009). The guidelines provided by WCAG 2. 0 are divided into different set of check points and every checkpoint is assigned different level according to severity (Freire et al, 2008). One of the web accessibility evaluation methods is to involve user in this evaluation process. The user will interact and explore the real problems relating to accessibility. Strictly adopting the guidelines provided by WAI‘s WCAG does not guarantee the success. User’s experience is necessary to validate the accessibility of web content. There are some automated tools to evaluate the accessibility of any web content. According to WAI the following documents can be part of evaluation of web accessibility. a) Preliminary Review of web content for Accessibility b) Conformance evaluation of web content for Accessibility c) Involving Users in Web Accessibility Evaluation d) Evaluation of Web content Accessibility through tools. So evaluation of accessibility of any web content depends upon adherence of guidelines and user satisfaction level. In this thesis project we have evaluate accessibility of GIS web content by firstly using tool to check the adherence of guidelines provided by WAI‘s WCAG 2. 0 and then conduct survey of users with disabilities. 2. 8 What is User Centred Design (UCD) UCD is a broad term and it is defined as the design philosophy or process in which needs, limitations and demands of end users of an interface have been extensively considered in the entire design process. The entire design process revolves around the end users who have core role in the design process. In other words, UCD is a multi-stage problem solving process in which designer not only analyzes how the users interact with the interface but also perform a test to validate their assumptions with respect to user behaviour in real world scenario. The main distinction of UCD from other design philosophies is that UCD optimizes the user interface according to which users feel easiness and want to work rather than bounding the user to change their behaviour according to the design approach. Currently, different UCD models and approaches have been used to design a product and each approach has its own pros and cons. Models assist the software designers in engineering a product for their users. In these models requirement of the users are kept under consideration right from the beginning till to the end of the product cycle. All the following models follow ISO (ISO 13407 model, 1999) standard. These models are as: Cooperative design: This approach evolved in Scandinavia since 1970. End-users are involved very early in the design process. Thus end-user is given a ‘voice’ in the design and development process and ultimately this thing enhances the quality of end results. Cooperative design demands the right set of participants, right location and physical space. It is also essential to create such environment in which all participants can contribute actively to get some meaningful results. (Bodker et al, 2000) Due to cultural difference among users and designers it may be possible that users are unable to understand the language of designers. So for this purpose it is recommended that prototypes such as mock-ups (three dimensional paper based representation) or a paper based outline for web screen shots or other product. Abras et al, 2004) Participatory design: It correlates with the cooperative design in which end users, developers and business representatives work collaboratively. This design model is more beneficial in early stages of design process. This design model gives a lot of advantages such as * Provide equal participation opportunity to technical and non-technical members * Provide the close collaboration between developers and end users * Provide a forum for investigating product related issues. (Gaffney, 1999) Contextual design: Context design also called customer centre design provides the assistance to cross-functional team to reach an agreement on what the customer‘s needs and how to design the product for their customers. Cross-functional team listen the whole story of an interview but confine the concepts and issues related to design problem. Contextual design user says â€Å"When I was coding I was behind a mirror but when I sat together with the user in front of the system, I felt like I was looking through the mirror and becoming aware that there was a human being on the other side†. Holtzblatt, 2001) The term ‘User Centred Design’ was presented by the Donald Norman in 1980s and then this term widely spread after the publication of the book entitled: User-Centred System Design: New Perspectives on Human-Computer Interaction (Norman Draper, 1986). In the book The Psychology of Everyday Things (POET) (Norman, 1988), Norman has further built on UCD concepts. He has proposed four suggestions related to interface design * The interface should be simple enough in order to determine the possible actions at any moment. The things on the interface should be visible. * Current state of the system should be evaluated easily. * Interface provides the natural mappings between the required actions and intentions; between actions and the resulting effect; and between the interpretation of the system state and visible information. According to Donald Norman recommendation, user should be in the centre of the design. Designer should design the interface that assists the users in performing their tasks and users have to put a little effort to learn a system. Small pamphlet should be delivered along with the products but that pamphlets should be understandable. Just to say designer the design of the product should be intuitive is not enough. There are some designs principles that should be adopted to give better outcome. Norman (1988) has recommended seven designs principles that can assist the designers in their task. 1. Utilize the knowledge both in the world and in the head. Build the manual before implementing the design and it should be in understandable format. 2. Structure of the tasks should be simple that giving full control to the user ver tasks. Tasks provide mental aids to the user for easy archival of information. 3. Things should be visible such that if user presses right click (mouse) on an object it exposes its full functionality for the user. 4. Graphics or icons should be used to make the things understandable. 5. Constraints both artificial and natural should be used to restrict the users. 6. After proper error tracking , the error should be displayed before the user in readable and understandable format so that user can perform error recovery. 7. Standardize the action if all else fails to avoid any abnormal action. In short all the work performed by Norman stressed on the exploration of user needs and requirements before designing the product. 2. 9 Advantages and disadvantages of UCD Table 2. 1: Advantages/disadvantages of UCD Advantages Disadvantages 2. 10 Elements of UCD According to Katz-Haas (2004), UCD model have the following four elements. 1. Visibility: Visibility provides the assistance to the user in constructing the mental model about the things. Essential elements such as those that aids in navigation should be highly visible for the user. Visibility is such that user can predict what he can do and what he cannot at a glance. The important information should be made prominent and placed at top place. 2. Accessibility: Accessibility is another element of UCD in which information is made available for the users easily and quickly no matter what the size of the document either it is long or short. Avoid the users from brainstorming to find specific information. Variety of ways have been provided to look into the information such as search function, page no and navigation elements. Chunking’ technique should be used in which information is divided into sections or blocks and relevant information is kept together and organized in a meaningful manner. Bold and italic pattern is used to make the information prominent. 3. Legibility: Text such as text size, font and style should be used that make the information convenient for the readers. It is hard to read such text or information written in ornamental fonts or all in capital letters but making bold and italic to the text can be helpful for the readers. High-figure-ground contrast between text and background can enhance the legibility such as dark text on light ackground. 4. Language: Information should be displayed in short sentences and in simple words instead of using technical terms. Utilize the active voice or verbs for writing information instead of noun strings. 2. 11 UCD and Web based GIS Although GIS are dominating in the market and usage of them are increasing but on the side usability of GIS technology is pitiable. Poorly designed GIS user interface can be made usable by arranging the training for them but this solution is not good according to the economic point of view. Relating to GIS user interface it is said â€Å"GIS user interfaces should be designed such that they fulfil user requirements instead of adapting the end-user to a GIS†. Comprehensive and accurate knowledge of the user requirements acts as a prerequisite for the GIS customization and development and it is said â€Å"User requirements are the criteria against which quality of GIS is tested†. Quality of use is also defined and measured like other technical and economical quality aspects. Quality of use is a multi-dimensional concept in which multiple aspects are checked such as robustness, visibility; learn ability, legibility and accessibility. Quality of use should be evaluated during the customization and development phase in order to get rid of the expensive market failures later. The development of GIS is different from other software development processes as GIS user interfaces are very complex and to make them usable it is essential to tailor them to specific user requirements. Mostly users interact with web based GI data and modify the parameters to achieve their desired results on the screen so it is crucial to provide interactive interface between end-users and the GIS. The design principles of UCD may be helpful for creating effective, efficient, innovative and interactive GIS user interfaces. Focus on end-users Iterative design appropriate allocation of functions between end-user and GIS Multidisciplinary design team (European Commission, 2005) 1. Focus on end-users End-users can contribute a lot in the design process of GI user interface by sharing knowledge and experience about GIS domain, tasks, workflows, object